No smartphone no life?: The birth of a new 'god' in aniverse?

Published by Halfey Halphstein, August 12th, 2017

Imagine the world where you are the only one who have a smartphone and the only one who can use it. On top of that you can use all kinds of magic and have yourself covered in bitches every time you wake up in the morning.

Isekai wa Smartphone to Tomo ni. The anime that I only had little expectation at first but turned out to be something that I don't want to miss.

I mentioned the word 'god' in the title. I'm not sure how many main character 'gods' are there in aniverse (anime universe) but the earliest I could remember is Haruhi Suzumiya. Then come Madoka Magica (I became a follower of the Church of Madoka) and more recently we have "Onii-sama", an over-the-top kind of hero every guy dreams to be. Some people even regarded "Onii-sama" as "the Chuck Norris of the anime world" so if you've heard of those "Chuck Norris facts" they're also applicable to "Onii-sama" except for the beard-related ones (because "Onii-sama" have no beard, at least not yet). You don't know who is this "Onii-sama"? Then screw you. He will erase your existence as soon as you finished reading this. By the way, One Punch Man is also obviously over-the-top I've never heard of him being made a 'god' in the anime fandom. In fact I don't even see him that way and won't acknowledge his 'god' status either should someone decide to campaign for that.

Back to the main subject, at first I thought Isekai wa Smartphone to Tomo ni was a boring anime that I'd drop in a few minutes. Actually it does have everything that could turn me off, like the overly damn straight-forward and somewhat predictable story, harem is a normal thing that nobody is going to object, as well as a hero who can overcome any obstacle with ease or facing just a little resistance. However somehow I find the use of smartphone in the world of magic and elves seems very interesting because I also had that thought running in my head sometimes. This is not the first time a smartphone being used extensively in a parallel world setting in anime. The last one I could think of was from Oda Nobuna no Yabou. However in that anime the smartphone's importance were limited to being a shield that prevented the main character's death. That said maybe it is in Isekai wa Smartphone to Tomo ni that smartphone being used very seriously for the first time in anime that it is the main part of the plot.

So how is 'god' relevant to this anime? Well see when I said "a hero who can overcome any obstacle with ease or facing just a little resistance" in the above paragraph, as well as the "can use all kinds of magic and have yourself covered in bitches " in the first line? I specifically refer to the main character of this anime, a teenage dude who made a deal with the real god so that when he arrived in the magic world he can keep using his smartphone but he can't go back to his original world (Convenient? Reasonable? Fair? I don't know). Apparently he got spoiled so much but the real god that he is blessed with the affinity with all elements of magic, complete with heightened physical stats beyond normal human to the point that if this was a game it would be considered as god mode or cheating. Yeah he was "spoiled" by the god that he himself ended up being god-like in terms of physical and magical abilities but I on the other hand won't spoil about how did he manage to strike a strange (but awesome) deal with the god in the first place. Go watch it if you're curious, if you have time to spare (yeah, I ask you to try watching it ONLY IF you have spare time so that you won't complain "give me back the x minutes of my life!" if you found it not to your liking later).

I would not touch about the quality of the animation (I don't think I have the capacity to do the judgment anyway) and I've seen cuter girls in other anime in this Summer 2017 season. I won't even call this anime the best in this season but I'm really hooked to it for a strange reason that I still can't understand. I won't recommend it to anybody and ask everyone to watch the first episode and do your judgment. Even if you end up dropping it and won't even finish the first episode, you won't miss much anyway. Anyway I don't hate this anime and will not give up on it despite having doubt about it in the beginning. Now that I think about it again even I feel weird about myself hahahah!